The Presidential Office yesterday denounced the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) for launching joint military drills around Taiwan, calling Beijing a “troublemaker.”
The condemnation came after the PLA’s Eastern Theater Command yesterday morning announced the start of a new round of joint exercises around Taiwan, featuring the army, navy, air and rocket forces to “close in” on Taiwan from “multiple directions.”
The exercises served as “a stern warning” to “Taiwan independence” separatist forces, China’s Taiwan Affairs Office said.
Photo: Lo Pei-de, Taipei Times
As of 3pm yesterday, the PLA’s Eastern Theater Command said it had conducted drills in waters to the north, south and east of Taiwan, featuring “air interception, assault on maritime targets, strikes on ground objects, and joint blockade and control,” adding that these drills were aimed at testing troops’ capabilities in carrying out integrated operations, seizure of operational control and multidirectional precision strikes.
Condemning the exercises, the Presidential Office in a statement said that China has continued to “engage in military provocations and gray zone tactics” in the Taiwan Strait and the Indo-Pacific region.
China is “a troublemaker,” unilaterally escalating the regional situation and blatantly challenging the international order, it added.
Photo: Ministry of National Defense via AP
“China’s blatant military provocations not only threaten peace in the #Taiwan Strait but also undermine security in the entire region, as evidenced by drills near Australia, New Zealand, Japan, [South] Korea, the Philippines & the SCS. We strongly condemn China’s escalatory behavior,” the Presidential Office said in a message on the social media platform X.
The SCS refers to the South China Sea, the strategic waterway that China claims almost in its entirety. The Chinese navy also recently held drills near Australia and New Zealand for which it gave no warning, forcing the last-minute rerouting of commercial flights.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs in a statement also condemned the Chinese drills, “again challenging the rules-based international order, unilaterally and severely damaging peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait and the [Indo-Pacific] region.”
Photo: CNA
The US is closely monitoring China’s military activity near Taiwan and will continue to support Taiwan in the face of Beijing’s military, economic and diplomatic pressure, a US Department of State spokesperson said yesterday.
“China has shown that it is not a responsible actor and has no problem putting the region’s security and prosperity at risk. There is no justification for China’s irresponsible threats and military pressure operations near Taiwan,” the spokesperson said.
The EU yesterday also accused China of increasing cross-strait tensions by holding military drills around Taiwan, and called on all parties to "exercise restraint."
Photo: Reuters
"China’s large-scale military drills around Taiwan are increasing cross-strait tensions," EU Foreign Affairs and Security Policy lead spokesperson Anitta Hipper said. "We
call on all parties to exercise restraint and avoid any actions that may further escalate tensions, which should be resolved through cross-strait dialogue."
Earlier yesterday, Minister of National Defense Wellington Koo (顧立雄) said the defense ministry had established a “response center” earlier that day to monitor the PLA exercises.
The ministry has been monitoring related PLA activities since Saturday, Koo added.
At an emergency press briefing later yesterday to make public the government’s response to the latest round of drills, which began at 7:30am, the ministry said that as of yesterday afternoon, it had detected 13 PLA naval vessels, four coast guard vessels and 71 military aircraft operating around Taiwan.
Among the 71, 36 crossed the Taiwan Strait median line, said Lieutenant General Hsieh Jih-sheng (謝日升), head of the ministry’s Office of the Deputy Chief of General Staff for Intelligence.
On the eastern side of Taiwan, Hsieh said that the military had identified an eight-vessel naval fleet led by the Shandong aircraft carrier operating in the Pacific Ocean about 220 nautical miles (407km) southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), the southernmost point of Taiwan proper.
Asked how close the Chinese military was, Hsieh said none of the PLA warplanes and warships had entered the nation’s contiguous zone, an area that is adjacent to territorial sea and airspace, and extends a maximum of 24 nautical miles from the coast.
The military has also not detected live-fire drills by the PLA forces, he said, adding that the military could not predict when the latest round of exercises would conclude.
The PLA’s ongoing drills are part of China’s years-long “gray zone” harassment of the country, he said.
Major General Tung Chi-hsing (董冀星), director of the ministry’s joint operations planning division, said the armed forces have established an ad hoc emergency operations center and deployed military aircraft, vessels and coastal missile systems following the PLA’s announcement of drills early yesterday.
The military is conducting patrols and monitoring Chinese troops, Tung said.
The armed forces would adjust their combat readiness level based on the level of the PLA threats, he added.
Meanwhile, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said that at about the same time the PLA Eastern Theater Command issued a statement about the drills yesterday, it detected China Coast Guard vessels 14607 and 14517 approaching Dongyin Island (東引), which is part of Lienchiang County.
The CGA dispatched vessels in response to the ships, which the China Coast Guard claimed were “conducting law enforcement patrols.”
Additional reporting by Lee I-chia
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